T

he post reformasi generation is leading the way forward toward a new Indonesia where falling in love should not be tantamount to a crime.

Four graduates and a law student filed a request for a judicial review of the 1974 Marriage Law with the Constitutional Court last Thursday. The law says that weddings must be conducted according to the religious beliefs of the bride and groom, thus, making it legally impossible for interfaith marriages to occur, although the law does not actually ban such unions.

Many can point to friends and family members whose interfaith romantic relationships have been in a bind for over a decade, or have ended because of religious differences and fears of upsetting parents. Many have opted to wed overseas or have converted only for the formality of the wedding ritual, while others have taken the risk of marrying regardless and have been disowned by their families.

The hardships of all these Romeos and Juliets have largely been treated as private problems, considered as the consequences couples must face when they happen to be of different faiths. Stories of love, conflict and despair are popular materials for movies and novels, but changing state policy is an entirely different ball game.

As citizens interact in increasingly urban settings, not necessarily within the country, relationships involving diverse backgrounds become inevitable and several websites now address interfaith relations, complete with tips for individuals from different nationalities and different religions on how to get married when neither wishes to convert to his or her partner'€™s belief. These young adults who filed the judicial review are reminding us that the state, as declared in the amended Constitution, has a fundamental obligation that they say contradicts the 1974 law: ensuring freedom of worship under a marriage law that forces someone to convert to another, mainstream faith not his or her own in order to be able to wed legally.

However, the plaintiffs, as one judge reminded them, will need to offer realistic alternatives to a society that is more religious than secular in its thinking. As the state ideology Pancasila implies, judge Arief Hidayat said, faith in the One Almighty God '€œshould be applied to our social lives'€. If the court decided to revoke the article in the law requiring religious rituals for marriages, he said, all marriages in Indonesia would lack a sacred foundation while many believe weddings should be religious commitments.

Meanwhile, couples of different faiths may find their deep unhappiness, ironic in the context of the euphoria of reformasi, is somehow linked to more people becoming more devout and unwittingly following the teachings of conservatives who remind us more loudly nowadays to stick to our religious flock, despite world praise for our progressing democracy.

The experts will debate whether the law is still relevant if it is aimed at preserving interfaith harmony by respecting each religion in isolation and what being neither a religious nor a secular state entails. The court'€™s verdict is crucial to this request for a judicial review to answer how the state should facilitate citizens who wish to enter into marriage while remaining true to their beliefs.